If you're 'wearing the green' on St. Patrick's Day in London, you'll doubtless be making your way to Trafalgar Square to join in the celebrations from midday until 6pm, before sampling a touch of the black stuff in a nearby festive Irish pub.

London's annual colorful St. Patrick's Day Parade sets off from Green Park at midday and wends its way with appropriately lustymusical oompapa bandsthrough the West End to Trafalgar Square. There you can watch Irish Dance and listen to Irish folk Music and stand-up comics from the Emerald Isle on the open-air stage.

From Trafalgar Square it's just a short walk to my favorite Irish pub; the Porterhouse in Covent Garden.

The Porterhouse is the London flagship of the independent brewing company , the Porterhouse Brewing Co of Dublin. Irish New Yorkers will doubtless have sussed out Fraunces Tavern, the Porterhouse pub in Manhattan. Their london pub is my regular lunchtime stop when I am visiting Covent Garden. Their Oyster Stout is a favorite tipple of mine and they also have that fulsome Wrasslers XXXX Stout from Klonakilty in County Cork. Klonakilty is also home of course to the Black Pudding Company, whose famed Klonakilty black puds help to make an Irish cooked breakfast such a feast for visitors to Dublin, Cork, Galway and elsewhere in that lovely country. It can now be bought at Harrods, Harvey Nichols, Fortnum & Mason, Selfridge, and enterprising butchers and Irish shops in London, (though sadly it is as yet unavailable in USA and Canada due to import restrictions).

As well as their own delectable brews, the Porterhouse prides itself on stocking a considerable number of craft beers and stouts from Belgium and Germany, which can provide an instructive evening of sampling, though you probably won't remember too much about it the next day. There's live music from 3pm and a late night bar extension on Paddy's Day at The Porterhouse, and probably every other Irish pub in London.

If you follow Irish rugby football, you'll be able to start celebrating Paddy's Day on Friday at Waxy O'Connors in Leicester Square, so get on down there before the locals drink the joint dry!

Slainte!...and if you know of a London pub that has Redbreast 12 year old single malt pot still Irish Whiskey, drop me a line!